In mid-May, just as galleys of Dustin Thomason's novel “12.21” were being mailed to reviewers, news reports came out explaining that archaeologists in Guatemala had found new Mayan astronomical records providing fresh evidence that they never believed the world would end in 2012.

The myth had grown for centuries that Mayan calendars, tied to astronomical records, predicted the end of time on Dec. 21, 2012, something in which only the gullible and Hollywood movie producers would invest.

Will this spring's discovery keep readers away from Thomason's novel? Probably not. A thriller is a thriller, and Thomason made a name for himself in 2004 when he co-authored, with Ian Caldwell, the 2-million-selling thriller “The Rule of Four.”

“The Rule of Four,” about a puzzling 1499 metaphorical manuscript from Italy titled “Hypnerotomachia Poliphili,” was promoted as the best thriller since Dan Brown's “Da Vinci Code.” Both books were hyped beyond their merits.

In “12.21,” Thomason tries to capitalize on Mayan calendar hysteria by concocting a pandemic that breaks out in Los Angeles about a week before Dec. 21. The illness involves a variation on mad cow disease that can spread from human to human through the eyes.

The novel provides scientific background on prions, the protein particles that in Thomason's novel can cause sleeplessness until the victim dies a painful and often violent death.

The disease came to Los Angeles from a Guatemalan who has smuggled a glyphic Mayan manuscript from a newly discovered Mayan city. The manuscript is surreptitiously delivered to a Guatemalan native named Chel Manu, a Mayan scholar at Los Angeles' Getty Museum. The scholar is then pressed into the seemingly unrelated duty of interpreting a hospital interview of the pandemic's first victim.

As the disease spreads rapidly, Los Angeles is quarantined, leading to panic-driven riots and arson as thousands fall ill.

The rest of the novel is aimed at the main characters trying to find whether the Mayan manuscript can provide clues about the source of the illness — and a possible remedy.

But translations of the Mayan manuscript text, made up by Thomason and taking up whole chapters, do not seem authentic.

The main action is concentrated over a week's time. Unless readers are fond of Los Angeles, it is unlikely many will find much to care about among the characters. The plot seems overly contrived. It plays off, after all, the flimsy Mayan calendar hoax.